Chennai

Former New Zealand cricketer Simon Doull has criticised MS Dhoni for his 16-ball 37-run innings against Delhi Capitals over the last weekend. The cricketer-tuned-commentator pointed towards Dhoni's denial of singles in the penultimate over which contributed to Chennai Super Kings (CSK) facing their first loss of the season.

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With the game almost out of reach, Dhoni took the onus on himself to hit the big ones and refused to take singles, keeping Ravindra Jadeja as a spectator on the other end. 

"I know there was a lot of hoopla about Dhoni's innings but he blocked a lot of balls. He faced a lot of dots and then when he started to not take runs, I could not believe what I was watching. I know he is the great MS Dhoni but it was a poor call. It was a really poor call not to take those runs," said Doull.

The five-time champions were chasing a difficult target of 192 and had been trudging at a lowly run rate of 7.5 when Dhoni arrived at the crease in the 17th over. At that stage, CSK required another 72 runs in 23 balls and Dhoni started off by hitting couple of boundaries in his first three deliveries. However, he refused singles in the 19th over which only yielded five runs. 

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"You are still trying to win the game and I know it is his first bat in a long time, first bat of the season and he is probably thinking at some stage of maybe getting to find some form but I didn't agree with it. I didn't agree with what happened in that situation. To me, it was a really poor look. I was watching it and thinking you know, it didn't look good for me. That just didn't look quite right to me when he wasn't taking runs," he added.

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Dhoni should come up 

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While the Kiwi criticised Dhoni for his innings, other former players were full of praise of the veteran, with many suggesting that he come up the order to provide impetus to CSK's innings. 

Australian pacer Brett Lee was the first one to make the case for Dhoni to be pushed up the order by the CSK management.  

"He was on tonight, he was not rusty. I do want more from him in terms of batting. Get yourself up the order. He is outstanding, his brain is still nice and sharp, CSK please get MS Dhoni up the order," the former Aussie fast bowler said.

Also read | IPL 2024: Former Indian, Australian players urge CSK to promote MS Dhoni up the order after Vizag blitz

Mohammed Kaif echoed a similar sentiment and said Dhoni did not look like a player who had not played cricket in the last year or so. 

"The way he batted today, this No.8 isn't his spot. He should be playing at No.4 or No.5. Come in and playing a few deliveries but Dhoni is batting way too low at No.8. The form that we saw today, that spot is too low and you would like to see him come early and help CSK win matches," said Kaif.